Bench simulators: pyrotechnic lines and electrical loads

A cabinet that, during check-out, replaces a launch vehicle's real pyrotechnic circuits with electrically equivalent loads, for the prime contractor of a European launch vehicle. It allows the separation and ignition command chains to be exercised and verified in full — the most critical chains on a vehicle, because they are single-shot and cannot be re-run — with nothing firing.

The delivery includes the front configuration panels, with each line individually identified and independently commandable, and the wired power-resistor load planes at the rear, sized to absorb the energy of the real command.

The second unit presents the control bench with electrical loads equivalent to those of the vehicle's real users, so that power and command chains can be exercised at full scale before the vehicle exists, or without exposing it. Together the two cover the part of the bench that verifies itself: IN SY TO held system responsibility and carried out mechanical and electronic development and AIT.

Role

R1 — System responsible; R5 — Specialist support to AIT. Scale: cabinet and unit, new build. Customer: the prime contractor of a European launch vehicle.

Work performed

• System design and simulator design
• Mechanical and electronic development
• AIT activities and support to AIT activities